The United States is a nation facing a profound and fundamental decision - Who are we going to be? The greatest threat to America's enduring legacy of self-determination, self-reliance, and personal responsibility is the people themselves. The crux of our democratic republic is an active, informed, and responsible citizenry. "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." - Wendell Phillips

Friday, July 20, 2012

Our National Cornerstone

Responsibility – fulfilling the commitment to consistently perform
the duties necessary to maintain a righteous and virtuous state of being. It is such a simple and yet powerful concept;
the essential quality enabling America’s rise to prominence. Responsibility is at the core of everything
good about our country, while the lack of it is the cause of all that is wrong
with it. The Founding Fathers designed our
governmental system to be wholly dependent on it, demanding that the people exercise
it as the custodians of our democratic republic. Freedom and liberty cannot exist in the
absence of responsibility for the power of government cannot be restrained when
the citizens do not hold themselves accountable to do so. Responsibility is hard, never ending work
requiring constant vigilance. It is the
foundation of American exceptionalism, the unique characteristic differentiating
us from the rest of the world. It is the
source of our legend.

As I have stated before, every great civilization
falls. The reason being the people lose sight
of their essential defining quality, that which elevates them from the realm of
ordinary to the venerated ranks of exceptional.
The descent is foretold through the occurrence of several events. Appreciation
for being extraordinary is replaced by complacency. Success is vilified, failure is explained
away, and mediocrity is accepted as the new normal. Unfortunately, this sounds familiar. We are in the midst of this transformation
now. All that was once celebrated and
cherished is being systematically condemned or societally dismissed. We tread forward at our own peril.

American foundational values such as family, achievement,
personal accountability, common sense, temperance, hard work, drive, and earning
one’s way have seemingly gone by the wayside.
Left in the wake is a country that is but a mere shadow of its former
self. Our children have gone astray, no
longer able to rely upon the guidance and support of their families. Entitlement and an engrained sense of being
owed have supplanted the ethos of earned success and self-reliance. We elected a national government of one party
rule centered on a thinly veiled message of hope and change based in victimization,
blame, and the cure all of the expansion of governmental power. We have
become our own worst enemy, as we sought some villain to punish for our own bad
deeds, our own poor decisions. A
responsible people, ones that believed in the sanctity of self-determination
and personal liberty would have fervently rejected any candidate or political party
that dared to campaign on the notion that increased government intervention was
key to our salvation.

Today we are inundated with the results of our
irresponsible: runaway debt, widespread obesity, ineffectual citizen elected government,
increasing levels of envy manifesting itself in class warfare, scarcity of
logic and common sense, and an increasingly entrenched belief in being owed success. We are a society so consumed with possessions
we no longer consider our ability to afford them. While we voice a desire for monetary
discipline, we do not support this claim when an elected official exhibits the
rare audacity to propose spending cuts. Many
now support efforts to increase taxes, but only on other people. These same people are rallying to the desperate
call of jealousy, embracing the notion that those that have attained monetary
success have done so at our expense. We
devalue competition and marginalize feats of accomplishment in a counterproductive
effort to advance our society. Even our
eating habits show evidence of our failings; sacrificing our long term health
for the immediate satisfaction of a cheeseburger while allowing the redefinition
of children’s play from riding bikes or throwing a ball to spending hours in
front of a TV with a game controller in hand while munching away on whatever
waistline expanding snack is available.

We are facing a very serious situation, and when we decide
to finally get serious about addressing our nation’s many issues and putting
ourselves back on a path to prosperity and global prominence, responsibility will
be our compass. We have lost our way by
forgetting that greatness requires commitment to be attained and
maintained. While dependence is easier,
it is never revered, never the stuff of dreams.
It is the result of settling, accepting defeat and subjugation. There is no need for another stimulus, higher
taxes, or some highly detailed government plan.
We need to accept responsibility for our lives and our current national
situation. The results would be smaller,
constrained, and less intrusive government; an economic environment fostering
growth; a more fit and healthy population; happier and more confident children;
a return to the celebration of accomplishment; and a rebuilding of our national
character. No one is more formidable at
confronting a difficult challenge than Americans. Overcoming the odds is what we do, what we
built our reputation on. We do not need nor should we want government to save
us. We broke it, so we need to ante up and
fix it. The individual, not government, must be the most influential factor in determining the direction of our nation. When we return to a culture embracing
responsibility, we will unleash the force that drove us to supremacy, shaking
off the rust and reclaiming our rightful place at the pinnacle of human
civilization.

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